GPS Owl

GPS Owl Help

A quick introduction to GPS Owl.

Introduction

GPSOwl.com, used with our Android/smartphone app, together form a simple GPS reporting and location tracking system.
The app on the phone gathers and reports GPS positions, while the website is used to view those positions.
All you need to get started is an Android phone, and a free-trial or paid account for our website.

In the discussion below device refers to an Android smartphone or tablet that has GPS capability.

Get Setup

Follow these steps to get location tracking working for you:

1. Create an Account, if you haven't already.
Check your email for a registration confirmation and click the link in the email.

The app will now send GPS data from the Android device to our website.
Give your device a chance to pick up a GPS location and wait a minute or two for the location to be uploaded.
The app will attempt to minimize network usage by ignoring duplicate GPS positions.
However the app will send in a position at least once per hour as an indication that the app is still active.

Note: if you choose to send data only when connected to Wi-Fi, then the app will only send data when connected to Wi-Fi.
If there is no Wi-Fi connection then GPS data cannot be uploaded, and it is not possible for the website to show the most recent positional data.
If that doesn't make sense then click here.

The GPS App

An important part of the puzzle, our
app
captures GPS positions and reports them back to the website.

The Website

Use the website to check the location of your devices - and whatever they are associated with.
After you log in you will see a list of your devices.

Here is a quick list of the available features:

- On the left (or top) is a summary your devices including the most recently reported position timestamp.

- On the right (or bottom) is a map, with indicators showing the most recently reported position of each device.

- Click on a device name to center the map on that device.

- Click 'Show all on map' to insure all devices are visible on the map.

- Click 'Refresh device positions' to check to see if any of the devices has recently reported a new position. Do not use browser refresh for updates - that will take longer.